Empty Horizons: Second Chance

by Dinkledash

Chapter 1: The Way

The zebra stallion, not much more than a colt, checked the surrounding jungle once more, then set to work. Finding a young mpira tree in the moonlight, and deeming it sufficiently strong and flexible, he looped the top with a heavy cord. He took two notched dowels from his bag, tapped one with a carved point into the ground quietly with a cloth-wrapped hammer, and tied the tree-side cord around the other, which already had a loop of cord attached to it. He mated the notches on the two dowels after pulling down with all his weight, and tested the tension from the bent green wood as he did. Carefully, he laid the loop of the snare on the middle of the path, covering it with twigs and leaves. His trap set, he crept into the shrubs and crouched eagerly, hefting his wooden war club by slipping his hoof into the carved cuff grip.

Nuru floated fifty feet above him, her white stripes darkened with charcoal, buoyed by the gas bags of the kuruka uyoga fungus. She quietly reached into a bag at her side and took out a carved wooden knob, affixing it to the end of her spear to cover the point, effectively converting it into a long club. No need to maim or kill this foal. He is but a colt, and this must be his first battle. He certainly has made enough noise for a platoon of Fundi sappers. There will not be much honor in capturing such a one, but there would be even less in killing him.

She envisioned the attack; a quick stoop through the hole in the canopy through which she was spying on him, a clean, measured strike to the back of the head, and then if he were still conscious, a reasonable demand for his surrender. She had four captures already from the previous war, and also two kills, though she regretted those. I hope this one has the wits to surrender when he is beaten, and doesn’t mistake my small size for weakness. Still, those were Amu, known less for their brains than their courage and size. The Fundi were at least clever with their hooves, if not as skilled at war as the Vumba.

Nuru checked the straps on her gliding wings one last time. Now. She unhitched the toggle holding the gasbags around her midsection, and they shot up into the air as she snapped out the bamboo and cloth gliding wings that were strapped to her fore and rear legs. She controlled her shallow dive through the canopy of the rainforest, keeping her eye on her target, while using her peripheral vision to ensure she didn’t brush her wings on a branch or hanging vine and alert her quarry. As was typical for Vumba scouts, her small stature was more than made up for by her excellent night vision and agility.

Just at that moment, a go-away bird gave its namesake call, perhaps startled by her passage. “G’way! G’way!” The Fundi youth turned and looked up at the sound. His eyes widened as he saw the Vumba nightbird, diving on him as a tai stoops on a rabbit, painted in moonlight, lacking only the feathers to complete the illusion.

Nuru’s eyes narrowed as she silently cursed her ill luck, adjusting her balance to strike him on the side of the head instead of the back. She was almost upon him, and the bird’s warning wouldn’t matter. She struck, extending herself more than she liked, knowing she would be off balance on landing.

The spear-club whistled through empty air as the Fundi threw himself flat on the ground and rolled toward her, the club missing his face by no more than an inch. Good reactions! Perhaps capturing this colt would be something of an honor after all.

Nuru landed with less than her usual elegance, chagrined that the cry of a bird had spoiled her otherwise perfect attack. She cartwheeled away from the recovering sapper, finishing in a crouch and pulling a toggle that released the bindings on her wing harness. The cloth and bamboo contraption slid off her slender limbs as she tested the spongy soil of the rainforest beneath her hooves.

The sapper had recovered, and had his warclub cuffed and at the ready, but did not approach. He was looking around warily, glancing up to see if there would be any further aerial attacks. Foolish colt, if you are going to sacrifice your mobility by using a hoof-gripped weapon, at least get one with some reach!

Nuru held her spear club with two hoof lanyards, and tumbled toward him from her two-hoofed rearing stance, the weapon describing a graceful arc as she rolled past the Fundi, staying out of the range of his shorter war club. He parried well enough, deflecting the strike intended for his shoulder upwards so her arc finished high, but he had no opportunity for a rejoinder. She began the dance of the mkuki, her spear club weaving the flamingo as she jumped in and out of range, seeking to lull her opponent into a defensive pattern. Good two-hoof fighting required rare balance and coordination, but those she had.

He grinned while he parried and dodged her series of strikes. The single hoof weapon did afford him the ability to parry strongly. “I am Jumaane... and you will have... the honor of... being the first... of many prisoners I take... Vumba!”

Why the insolent… she almost faltered in her strikes, and pulled back just before she exposed her shoulder. He is baiting me! She didn’t reply, but instead switched to a different mkuki dance, the spider monkey, stabbing out seemingly at random. While he was trying to figure out the pattern, she lunged with full extension when his club was out of position, landing on her stomach, then rebounding after making contact. His head snapped back as the club struck him in the middle of his forehead, eyes crossed as he rolled backwards, barely remaining conscious.

Jumaane reeled back and forth, stumbling blindly out to the path, shaking his head to clear it. Nuru skipped after him with a whoop, her spear club aimed low to trip him. Finally!

The world whipped sideways as her leg was yanked out from under her, and she was dangling from a cord looped around her rear right hoof. The jungle danced upside-down in her vision. Curse the luck!

The first rays of the sun broke over the edge of the island and painted the jungle with dappled gold. Jumaane stood for a moment, grinned, then trotted over to claim his wriggling, cursing prize. “I see the rubber tree is bearing fruit early this year!”

“Come and pick it!” Nuru glared; she still had her spear, and while fighting from this position would be difficult, it was not impossible. She had trained in vine fighting, being an aerialist, and this colt’s unreasonable amount of luck would have to run out some time.

“Oh, you are a mare! I shall have to take care, harvesting this particular matunda!” He reached into his satchel and pulled out a rungu, a throwing club, fitting the catch at the tail into a notch on the head of the regular war club. “Vumba mares are well known to be the deadliest fruit in the jungle. Please surrender; I hate it when my fruit is bruised.”

“Idiot! Mpumbavu! I’ll never surrender!” She calmed her breathing and watched him carefully.

“Very well, but at least tell me your name before I brain you. So I know who’s parents will be receiving my maumivu ya maumivu.”

She grimaced at the thought of this idiot apologizing for killing her with a basket of regret flowers. “If you are trying to talk me to death, it is working!” The blood was pounding in her temples; her sour jest held in it a kernel of truth. If she did not extricate herself, her reflexes and concentration would suffer for it. She needed to provoke him. “Come and kill me, you coward!”

He snarled at the insult, and the rungu came whirling at her, but aimed for her midsection, not her head. She twisted and contorted her body, the heavy wooden ball at the end of the carved stick barely brushing the coat of her stomach. But he had not stood still watching his club fly; he moved forward immediately. He was on her. Rearing, he caught her mane in his free hoof. He lifted her head. He raised his war club. And stopped.

His jaw fell open as he looked into her eyes. He moved his mouth, but said no words. He lowered the club, and released her mane, then stepped back on three hooves, his eyes locked to hers.

He was handsome, there was no denying that. Shiny, healthy coat over a lean but powerful frame, blue eyes, a well-formed, even noble muzzle, standing there with his mouth half open like an… “IDIOT!” Nuru’s spear club whirled as she bent to counterbalance the weight of her weapon, landing solidly on his stupid, open jaw. He collapsed bonelessly with a thud.

She dropped the spear club by snapping the lanyards from the holding cuffs, then pushed the empty socket of the right cuff against the tang of a short bone knife kept in a belt sheath. She unsheathed it and quickly sawed through the cord binding her hoof, rolling as she landed. She pounced on the supine Jumaane, straddling his chest, placing the knife at his throat with her free forehoof pinning his mane to the ground. His eyes fluttered open, he blinked, and then he smiled.

“I am Nuru, you feebleminded, weak-willed, Fundi idiot! Your ridiculous luck has run out!” She sneered in his face. “You had me! Why did you not strike?”

“Because you are perfect.” The clear, shining blue eyes held no guile, no Fundi tricks; the smile was as innocent as a foal’s.

She hated herself as she felt the blush bloom in her cheeks. “I am very good, but I am not perfect. If I were perfect, I would not have startled the go-away bird, and you would already be on your way to the mines to work for me for the next ten moons, chipping ore out of the hard rock.”

“That is not what I meant, oh most beautiful of all mares.”

Her turquoise eyes widened and her cheeks now blazed crimson where the charcoal had been sweated off. “I have my knife in your throat, mpumbavu! Choose your next words very carefully. Now, do you surrender, or do you prefer death?”

Jumaare inhaled and had almost started to speak, when they heard a loud BADOUM! resound through the forest.

Nuru’s mouth fell open. “The peace drum?”

Jumaane grinned. “Sounds like a truce has been called already, Nuru. Now we shall never know.”

BADOUM!

“This is ridiculous! The war just started a few hours ago! I have you! You are my prisoner!”

BADOUM!

“Umm… technically, no. I haven’t surrendered.”

BADOUM!

“You were going to!” Nuru had never felt so cheated in her life.

BADOUM!

“W-w-would you mind putting that knife away?”

The drum fell silent, and with a show of reluctance she tucked the knife back in its sheath, twisting the cuff to release it. “I did defeat you. You were stupid. You should not have hesitated. We are enemies, and a war is no place for foolishness.”

“I do not wish to be your enemy.”

“It is not your choice, it just is. It is Njia. The Way. If it were not for your luck, you would be bound and on your own way to the mines for your foolishness.” She glowered at him. “Now all I have is the memory of your foolish face.”

“It is not my fault I am so lucky.” Jumaane shrugged. “It just is. It has always been that way.”

“Your good luck is my bad luck,” she replied sourly.

“If we were on the same side, my good luck would be yours.”

Nuru rolled her eyes. “Jumaane. Born on Tuesday? What stupid kind of name is that?”

“A lucky name! I was born on the second Tuesday of the second month of my mother’s twenty-second year. Very lucky!”

“Very foolish! You relied on your luck when you should have been training, and it shows! You are sloppy. Very loud. You do not pay attention to your surroundings.”

“That may be. Perhaps you can teach me.” He grinned as she scowled down at him.

“Why would I teach my enemy anything? More stupidity!”

BADOUM! - BADOUM!

They looked at each other in shock. The war was over!

BADOUM! - BADOUM!

Nuru looked about in confusion. “This must be the shortest war in history!”

Jumaane shrugged. “Sorry if my luck spoiled the whole war for you.”

BADOUM! - BADOUM!

She frowned. “Something is wrong. I’ve never heard of—”

BADOUM! - BADOUM! - BADOUM!

They were both silent.

BADOUM! - BADOUM! - BADOUM!

Jamaane cleared his throat. “Much as I enjoy being pinned down by you, I suppose you had better let me up if we are going to answer the summons.”

She jumped off the barrel of his chest, her face flushing. “You idiot!”

---

The Prophetess reared on her hind legs and looked out over the assembled tribes, gathered on the plain before Mount Tumaini where the House of Punda stood. She looked, but she did not see, because like all Prophetesses, she was born blind. Let them think that I am reviewing the multitudes with my famed second sight. She tapped her right hoof against the railing of the balcony while leaning on it with her left hoof.

Mshauri raised an eyebrow; she had never seen The Prophetess Maoni nervous or even mildly agitated before. “Prophetess, is there anything that I might do for you?”

Maoni, eighty-ninth Prophetess of the House of Punda and the spiritual leader of all Zebras, stopped tapping her hoof, and sighed. “Tell me we are doing the right thing.”

“Prophetess, it is you who tell us what the right thing is.” Mshauri considered offering to groom Maoni's mane. That always seemed to relax her.

“I know child, I know. By all signs, the time is upon us. I have consulted with Kumbukumbu, and he with the other memory singers, and he concurs. All the songs they can recall say that this is the day for which we have been waiting for. What has it been, a thousand years?” She stopped tapping and scratched under her chin.

Mshauri thought for a moment. “Nine hundred and eighty six years, Prophetess. By the solar calendar.”

“Thirty generations, and more, Mshauri. Nearly two hundred thousand zebras have been born, lived, loved, fought and died on Punda. It is all they ever knew; all their dams and grandsires and more greats than you can count grandparents ever knew, or even imagined. More than twelve thousand moons, and I have been here for eight hundred of them. Or so I am told.” She gestured at her pale eyes, and laughed softly.

Mshauri laughed as well, but more out of a sense of respect for Maoni than any feeling of good cheer. The Prophetess would hardly hear the soft smile the joke warranted, and in any case, all Mshauri felt now was a cold lump in her stomach. It was almost like standing on the edge of the island and looking into the swirling, misty deeps far below, watching a behemoth broach the water and look skyward with hunger. Her hooves felt tingly at the thought. I hate heights.

Maoni thought about the strange objects that were on the table, arranged so she could touch them; the chest, the books, the strange lizard, and the… she shuddered. The other items. They had been discovered by a routine glider patrol, and had been the subject of much study. “Describe them to me, once more, please. Tell me the story of their finding. Sing me a memory song.” She turned and slowly walked to the low oval table in the middle of the great chamber from which the balcony jutted. She patted one of the cushions that surrounded the table.

Mshauri followed and stopped next to her. “I am no memory singer, Prophetess.”

“No, but you are my Eye, and have seen what I cannot. You have such a lovely voice, child; far better than those old prunes. Do play on your kora; you are so talented.”

“I am hardly vipawa, Prophetess.” She blushed under her stripes.

“You’ve had to work hard to get as good as you are, unlike some few of us.” Maoni absently brushed her flank where the ananse ntontan, the wisdom alama, was displayed in black and white, the stylized spider web’s threads now tinged with gray. “Those of us marked like this just have an easier time of it. You play and sing as well as any I have ever heard, vipawa or not.”

“Thank you, Prophetess, but you know as well as I that we have not had a musical vipawa on Punda in over a century.” Now Mshauri genuinely did smile; she knew she would give in to the Prophetess, but the game must be played for its own sake.

“Indulge an old mare in the twilight of her life, my dear. And don’t roll your eyes. After all, they are mine too.”

“Of course, Prophetess. A moment, please, so I may retrieve my instrument.”

Maoni smiled, satisfied, walked to the largest pile of cushions, and lay down comfortably in the same spot as she had for decades of reclining at meals, memory recitals, and the never ending cycle of war councils and peace councils. Even though it wasn’t strictly necessary, she closed her eyes to listen.

Mshauri took her place on the playing stool and began tuning her instrument, tightening the tuning rings and adjusting the notched bridge that stuck out from the large round sounding board. Satisfied with the key she had selected, Mshauri strummed several chords on the large lyre-harp. Her voice rose in a warm, rich contralto.

The sun had quit,
the starlit night;
the jungle lit
by Luna’s light.

A nightbird flew
to waves below,
where troubles brew,
and witchlights glow.

She skims the seas.
The wind she rides.
What mysteries
might sail the tides?

What mysteries, indeed? Maoni rocked her head to the steady rhythm and simple tune of the memory song. She imagined the orphaned Vumba, raised and trained by the House of Punda as a nightbird, going about her evening’s work, sampling flotsam she spotted within gliding distance of the island. Brave work, that. More than one of our nightbirds had been lost to the snapping jaws of some nightmare thing from the depths.

She dipped her net,
to learn what might
be hers to get
upon this flight.

Her net was tore
by heavy weight.
The heft it bore
was much too great.

A box was found
by current brought,
in iron bound,
and clever wrought.

Maoni reached out to touch the heavy wooden chest, dry now, feeling where the wood had swollen around forged iron hardware.

Atop chest perch’d
a lizard lean.
All Punda searched;
it was not seen.

Two weeks of woe
did lizard float,
a-starving so,
upon his boat

Maoni touched the cage in which resided the now entirely recovered lizard. She was told it was bright red with yellow dots. The researchers estimated that it could not have lived more than two weeks, perhaps three on the outside, without a food source, allowing for rainfall to supply fresh water. But though they bickered over the timeline, they all agreed that the lizard was unlike any species found on Punda. And it wasn’t a sea creature. So that meant that somewhere, at least, there was dry land. And the box had gone into the water no more than three weeks ago.

And found within
when once retrieved,
was something which
was scarce believed.

Inside, were found
in Ponish tongue,
four books; all bound
when t’world was young.

Maioni reached out and touched the cover of one of the books laid out in front of her. Incredible, that these books had survived over a thousand years. Quite impossible to estimate, given the remarkable preservation spells that had been cast upon them, had it not been for the printing dates on the title pages. Zebras maintained an oral tradition, but were not illiterate. Books were often lost and were difficult to maintain in their humid climate, with no preservation spells of their own. Translating the Ponish into Zwahili was slow going, as the only existing works on the language were copies of copies of copies of written notes from several of the more scholarly Founders.

And last we found,
and most forlorn;
was twenty pound
of twisted horn!

That grisly find, she did not touch, but she knew that there, on the table, were thirty two unicorn horns, all sawed off at the base. To what purpose, the researchers could only speculate. Many showed signs of considerable age, and long term submersion in sea water. But five of them were rather… fresher. One still has damp marrow. Maoni shuddered. Six months ago, the owner of that horn had been alive. There are still unicorns in the world. And someone is cutting off their horns and putting them in chests.

Mshauri stopped playing. “Prophetess? Are you well?”

Maoni did not immediately respond, instead tapping her hoof nervously on the table.

“The song is not yet finished. I know it needs work before I send it to the memory singers. I hope it has not displeased you.”

“It is not that, child. It is just different hearing it sung than it is hearing the research report.” She made an effort to smile. “You know what they say. If you want the facts, read a book. If you want the truth, listen to a song.”

“Do you think that is true, Prophetess?”

“It is a fact, Mshauri.” Maoni smiled warmly. “Please, go tell the chiefs I have finished meditating, or communing with the great ancestral zebra spirits, or whatever it is they think I do.”

“Prophetess, I believe you commune with the ancestral zebra spirits. Your communion with them is so close, you do not even notice. You just think their voices are your own thoughts.”

“The ancestral zebra spirits must be a confused lot then. That is an interesting and yet totally unfalsifiable hypothesis, as the researchers would say. You should put more faith in what your eyes and ears tell you, and less in what others tell you, especially when they’re dead.”

“I put my faith in your wisdom, Prophetess, even if you will not. We all do.”

“Well then, perhaps I should put my faith in your faith. Because we will only ever get one chance at this. I had better be right.” She exhaled sharply while trilling her lips in resignation. “Right. Enough communing. Bring them in as soon as I put my mysterious face on.” She stopped smiling and rolled her blind eyes towards the ceiling. “There; now I am ready.”

---

Three chiefs sat on cushions surrounding the central table. Maoni reclined across from them, while Mshauri stood at her side. Refreshments and treats sat before them, all untouched.

Hasira, the diminutive Chief of the Vumba, sat to the Prophetess’ left, glaring challenge with her large yellow-gold eyes, the scars of war rendering an otherwise delicate and finely striped face grim and hard.

Next to her towered the enormous and jovial Mke, chief of the Amu, smiling disarmingly. Mshauri knew that behind those merry eyes was a mind as sharp as the spines of a razor tree.

To Maoni’s right sat the taciturn Wajanja, chief of the Fundi. He was whittling some object out of a small piece of wood, his hoofcuff rotating as he brought different tools to bear on it. The Fundi were famous fidgeters.

All around the room were murals recording the story of the world before the flood, with zebras, ponies, griffins, diamond dogs, hippogriffs, kirin and other creatures portrayed in front of stylized scenes of their homelands. The diarchs of Equestria held a prominent place within a fanciful rendition of Canterlot. As one went around the room, there were images of earthquake, flood, untold destruction, and terrible loss. After that, panels showed three groups of zebras climbing long ramps from a shattered, flooded land, into what appeared to be a floating tree. The last panel was of a single floating green island, a snow-peaked mountain surrounded by rainforest, the floating tree lying upon it on a plain, broken and surrounded by zebras walking off in three different directions, except for a few, who appeared to be building a shelter out of the remains of the vessel.

There were other decorations as well. One painting was of a squadron of zebras with gliding harnesses, fighting giant birds. Another showed a column of zebras wearing heavy armor, fighting some monstrous cross between an elephant and a great black snake. Among them was a single tan colored unicorn with a long black mane, firing bolts of magic from his horn. And next to that, an ancient skull, reverently placed on black cloth; that of a unicorn, with a long, curling horn. A plate in bronze, nearly illegible after centuries of polishing, noted that Ambassador Even Temper had died fighting the Grootslang, and would always be remembered as a friend to the zebras of Punda.

On the table itself, a colorfully woven blanket was draped over a group of objects. The chiefs eyed it, and one another, suspiciously, but said nothing.

Maoni held up one hoof and made a sweeping gesture. “My friends, thank you for responding to the summons. The spirits have advised me that the time for war is over. The time for peace is upon us.” She paused for a moment before continuing. “The Time of Flight is coming.”

“The Time of Flight!? That nonsense!?” Hasira reared up and slammed her hooves on the tabletop. Even on her hind legs, she was still have a head shorter than Mke.

“Hasira, we are in the House of Punda, not a bia bar.” Mke frowned his disapproval.

Wajanja put down his whittling and cleared his throat. “Just because she stopped your war, Hasira, that does not give you the right to yell at the Prophetess.”

“My war?” She whirled on the Fundi chief. “I am not the one who flooded the mine at Dhahabu to build a water wheel! And you,” she jabbed a hoof towards Mke’s large stomach, “must be an expert on bia!”

Mke smiled broadly, patting his ample gut. “It is true.”

Maoni fixed Hasira with a blind stare. “The war is over. The peace is declared, unilaterally, in the name of our ancestral spirits. I do not exercise this right lightly. The time of peace is upon us.”

“Yes, but the Time of Flight? That is an old dam’s tale!” Hasira sat down, unhappy, but unwilling to dispute the rights of the House of Punda.

“No, chief, it is not.” Maoni stood. “It is the reason the House of Punda exists. Mshauri, would you, please?”

Mshauri reached out and removed the blanket that had been draped over the chest, books, and the cage in which the brightly painted lizard perched. There was a gasp from around the table, followed by a babble of voices asking questions on top of one another.

“Please, my friends, please.” Maoni raised her voice slightly. “One at a time. Chief Wajanja.”

“What language is on the spines of those books?” The Fundi chief was wide eyed.

“Ponish, from what I have been told. The books are incredibly ancient. Chief Mke?”

“That lizard! What kind is it?” The Amu’s jaw hung open.

“A species never seen in a thousand years. Chief Hasira?”

“What… what metal is that on the box? It is not copper, tin, or gold.” The diminutive chief leaned over the table to stroke the bands and hardware of the chest with her hoof. “It feels… hard. It should hold an edge very nicely.”

“It is called iron. It is much harder than bronze.” There was a moment of stunned silence, then Maoni spoke again. “There is more. Mshauri, would you please?”

The Eye of the Prophetess lifted the lid of the chest and tipped it forward. As the horns spilled out and rolled around on the table, the three chiefs recoiled in shock and horror.

Hasira jumped up, ran to one of the potted plants around the room, and was sick in it. Mke’s eyes rolled up and he fainted back onto his cushions. Wajanja reached out and caught one before it rolled off the table. He stared at it, turning it over. “I cannot believe it!”

Maoni’s voice was thin and breathy. It wavered with age. But she sang the last verse of one of the oldest and most mysterious of the memory songs.

When horns return
to zebra sight,
the sun will burn
on Time of Flight.

“The Time of Flight! What does it even mean?” Hasira spat into the pot and wiped her mouth on her pastern. “Unicorn horns and strange metal, those I can see and touch, but the Flight is just an old song! Just rhyming words! It does not explain anything!”

“Not everything is in the songs, you know, Chief Hasira. Tell me, how many of your tribe have fallen through the tunnels to the sea below, in the last tenyear? More than in the past hundred years. You delve ever deeper, and how much metal have you brought to the surface? How much ore is left on Punda?”

Hasira swallowed nervously. “You are better informed that I would have thought, Prophetess.”

Wajanja reached over to shake Mke. “You should be awake for this.”

The fat chief shook his head to clear it. “Gah! What? Unicorn horns? Cut off? Is this a nightmare?”

“Chief Mke, how grow your crops these days? Why has the amount of land the Amu have under cultivation increased by half in the past tenyear, but the harvest remains the same? How much topsoil is left?”

The huge stallion hung his head. “This year, I will be taxing bia so that more grain will be available for bread. Next year, we may have to outlaw bia. Our fields are down to bare rock in some places . In another tenyear, we will not be able to feed Punda, unless we clear another thousand acres of the upland forests.”

Maoni preempted Wajanja’s reply. “And speaking of the uplands, Chief Wajanja, how are the trees? How many more now fall in storms, their roots too shallow to hold them? You’ve had to take younger and younger trees every year, have you not?”

Wajanja nodded grimly. “There is not enough wood for our artisans to work. It is not like it was in my sire’s day, certainly. And the price of bronze tools has become rather... excessive.” He frowned at Hasira. “We were building a new sawmill on the Nyeupe river to bring lumber to market from higher in the uplands. You never told us your mines had been dug so far.”

“You did not tell us you were building a new mill. But as you must know now, we are having to go all the way across Punda for ore. The heart of The One Mountain is all but dug out. That is why our tools have become so expensive. We have not enough ore for our smelters, nor copper and tin for our smiths.” Hasria looked at the table, glumly. “But you know that now.”

Mke nodded. “To explain why prices were so high, would have been to admit weakness.”

“We are not weak!” Hasira bared her teeth and glared fiercly up at Mke.

Wajanja’s voice was quiet. “The Vumba are the smallest tribe; half in number compared to the Amu. You do not grow food in the fields, nor pick it from the trees of the forest. You must buy food, or live on mushrooms plucked from the mountainside. But you are not weak. We all acknowledge that, one-on-one, the Vumba are the most skilled fighters. Do you agree, Mke?”

The chief of the Amu looked unhappy. “If we could bring you to a full battle, with our numbers and our size, we would crush you, Hasira. You and your little birds. But you will not fight fair,” he whined.

Mollified, Hasira sat back on her cushions, then smiled at Mke. “No, we do not fight fair. But we do fight with honor. And you big Amu make such excellent miners when you’re captured.”

It was quiet for a moment, then Mke’s face split with a smile and he laughed, a shuddering earthquake of good humor. “Yes, we do!”

Wajanja waited for the laughter to quiet. “We did not intend to flood your mine. If we had known this would happen, we would have built elsewhere. I hope that none of your miners drowned.”

Hasira grunted. “No; we just had to abandon it. It was low grade ore anyway. Next time we are digging under the forest, we will let you know. If there is a next time.”

Wajanja nodded glumly, and Mke’s face dropped as they considered the dismal future.

Hasira faced the Prophetess. “So, the Time of Flight, is it? Very well, Prophetess! It is time for us all to leave and seek a new island! With topsoil, trees, brightly colored lizards, and this iron you’ve shown us. Very interesting, but how will we get there? Will we all sprout wings? Learn to walk on clouds, like the old tales say?”

Mshauri spoke quietly. “Shall I bring it now, Prophetess? Is that what the spirits desire?”

“Yes. The spirits say it is time for the great secret to be revealed.” Maoni’s uncertainty vanished. “It is the time!” she declared with firmness that surprised even herself.

Mshauri swept out of the room while the chiefs sat silently, glancing between one another and Maoni, until the Eye returned bearing a golden box. She placed it upon the table and opened it to reveal a rounded, black object cushioned by cloth of gold.

Mke broke the silence. “What is it? Some kind of coconut?”

“It is the seed of Nafasi Nyingine!” Mshauri bowed her head in reverence.

“A Second Chance? A treeship like Nafasi Ya Mwisho? The old tales, indeed!” Wajanja looked at Mshauri sharply. “The original treeship left a seed behind, and you kept that secret for a thousand years?”

Maoni answered him. “Yes. Had it been known of, the chiefs would have pressured the House to grow it before we knew that we were within three weeks travel of, if not another island, at least somewhere a boat of some sort has traveled. The lizard is still alive; it could not have survived for longer than that. We now know that there is someplace for us to go, and the box came in on the northern current, so we have a general direction. And we know that there are ponies, like in the old stories.”

Hasira still looked skeptical, but she spoke more respectfully. “Prophetess, what other secrets has the House of Punda kept? And what is to be done now?”

“You will see, and you will be told. The House will need the help and cooperation of every zebra on the island. We must grow Nafasi Nyingine, we must assemble and train a crew, we must send the ship to find a new land, and we must ask the spirits to help them return to us.”

“And what if the new land is full of ponies?” Mke looked at the horns with dread.

“We will do what we must, as we always have, my friend.” The Prophetess stood. “I ask that you go to your tribes and tell them. Tomorrow, we will plant Nafasi Nyingine in the Garden of Punda. It will grow quickly, but it will consume large quantities of water and fertilizer. A year, the scrolls say, until the treeship is ready. A year for us to train a crew and store supplies for the voyage. A year of peace, and then another year for them to find our new home.

“What crew?” Wajanja raised an eyebrow.

“Nafasi Nyingine will choose them.” Maoni smiled beatifically. “With the help of the ancestral spirits, of course.”

Comments

[Disasterman]

Congrats! Best of luck and I look forward to seeing the story continue.

[Psyonicg]

Can't wait to read the next chapter! Great work Dinkle!

[Dinkledash]

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Goldenwing’s editing deserves most of the credit, tbh. He made it 100% better.